


The Hawthorne Effect

by Ruler_of_Nope_Island



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Do Not Archive, F/F, Gen, Implied Violence, some mention of monster sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-09
Updated: 2018-03-09
Packaged: 2019-03-29 00:59:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13916001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruler_of_Nope_Island/pseuds/Ruler_of_Nope_Island
Summary: Daisy and Jon drive home after Sarah Baldwin escapes.





	The Hawthorne Effect

“Got a cigarette?”  
Jon looks up; notes the chill he feels at those words as if he was writing down supplementary notes to a statement. He and Daisy are driving back from their failed - perhaps - encounter at The Trophy Room and silence had settled on them like dust on old furniture. He was not surprised that Sarah Baldwin had got away; although he was slightly surprised that he felt annoyed he hadn’t seen Daisy do her worst to that thing. Of course, he’d already seen her do her worst to Michael Crew. But that was different. Even though Michael Crew had tried to kill him, was a murderer, was worse - condemning innocent people to a living hell was far worse than a quick death - encounters with The Stranger and its members felt so much more personal. He wonders aloud if those things can feel pain.   
Daisy chuckles; a low, happy rasp. Not an unpleasant laugh, all things considered.   
“I’m sure we’ll find out.”  
“In the interest of academic inquiry, of course.”  
“Sure.”  
Silence again.  
“So do you have a cigarette?”   
“Yes. Silk cuts alright?”  
“Fine.”  
“They never let me smoke in the car on the force,” Daisy says. “I suppose it’s one of the perks.”  
“I imagine there aren’t many.”  
“No. Elias is-”  
“A bastard. A piece of shit. A smug fuck in a suit.” A pause. “Hello if you’re watching.”  
Daisy chuckles again. Jon lights two cigarettes and hands one to her. Then he rolls down the window.   
“I’ve never seen something deglove its own hand before,” says Daisy, thoughtfully. “One of the vampires tried it once. I’ll have to think of other means of restraining them.”  
“Hammers, nails and wooden surfaces?”  
“Worth a try.”  
They stop at a set of lights. Daisy turns to look at him.  
“That’s a bit more...imaginative than I expected from you, Sims.”  
“I’m developing quite the imagination. Job hazard, I suppose. You read so much…”  
“Mmm. For me it suppose it comes...naturally. Nature versus nurture.”  
“Nurture?”  
“Sure. He’s turning you into something he wants. Something he can use.”  
“Something like you?”  
He watches her jaw clench and when the car goes forward it’s with a sudden jolt, sending hot flecks on ash onto his thighs.   
“Did that hurt?”  
“A little.”  
The face of his unnamed childhood tormentor arises; those little cruelties that began to stack up, slowly but surely, until they became part of his normality. He supposes he’ll always remember Daisy’s name, and, if not, he’ll always have her statements to look over. There’s no doubt in Jon’s mind that she’ll meet a similar fate to the nameless bully. But maybe, after that happens, he’ll have no need to think of her at all.   
“What’s the pretty one’s name?”  
“Tim.”  
“Christ he can whinge.”  
“He’s probably going to die because of the Institute. I feel like he’s entitled to it.”  
A pang of guilt, although something smothers it before it can grow into something else. This too he notes; the watcher watching itself.   
“I know I can’t kill him,” her tone is bland, as if she were discussing heavy traffic, “But I’m very tempted to bounce his head off the walls every so often.”  
“I can understand-”

He catches himself. He should be able to understand her point or empathise the with the need to deal with minor annoyances with violence. The vision of Daisy slamming Tim’s face into table appears, then scurries away on many guilty little legs.   
“You probably shouldn’t,” he replies weakly, and takes a drag on his cigarette.  
“That’s what I hate the most,” Daisy says. “The restraint. Elias says I can’t do this. Elias doesn’t trust me to do that. As if I haven’t been the best Section 31 officer in years.”  
But she’d gotten sloppy. Forgotten that she was a police officer first and a hunter second, at least in the real world. The Hunt could not be less than anything. Trevor Herbert, defying cancer and heroin, still out there chasing vampires and anything else that he caught the scent of; perhaps Daisy could be useful after all.

It’s beginning to get dark; clouds crawl across a red-streaked sky. Jon wants it to rain, thinking of Daisy’s first statement. He likes it when she’s not got that focussed anger. It’s like watching a wolf cower away from a cat. Oddly endearing, too. 

“So what’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen?” Daisy asks.  
It’s hard to imagine that it was only a few months ago that he had meet this woman and feared her.   
“Hard to say,” he admits. “Worm-infested woman? A man with hands as big and his body and knives for fingers? One of my assistants turn into a horrifying monster?”  
Daisy snorts.  
“Rate them on a one to ten.”  
“No-” he says suddenly. “No. It was Jurgen Leitner’s body.”  
“Really? If there was anyone who needed murdering, well - I’ve seen what his books could do. Seen worse beatings, too.”  
“It wasn’t that he was...well. It wasn’t the body. It was that I’d have to leave my archives. And I wouldn’t get the answers I needed.” And then, without meaning to - “What about you?”

He doesn’t expect her to start laughing. 

“You really can’t help yourself, can you?”  
“No more than you can.”  
Daisy shrugs.   
“Point. Well, since you asked - have you ever put your finger inside a cunt?”  
Jon flushes. Daisy smirks.  
“Well. Anyway. I met this girl - so pretty, I thought, but quiet. And we had a few drinks. The bar’s noisy and crowded and no one is paying us any attention so I put my hand up her skirt-”  
Jon feels nauseous.   
“And she’s not protesting or anything. And not wearing underwear. So I run my finger up and down, the way you-” another smirk “-well, maybe not you, do, and she’s not really wet. But she’s looking at me with these soft, pretty eyes, so I suck my fingers and put them inside her and it feels wrong.”  
“Wrong how?” the question comes from his mouth without any sort of input from his brain. He doesn’t want to know but at the same time something hungers for the answer.”  
“I couldn’t quite work it out until I looked at my fingers -”  
Another stoplight and Daisy turns to look at him.  
“They were covered in cobwebs.”  
“Jesus Christ.”  
Jon’s stomach turns. In his mind eye he sees it, Daisy leaning over some small woman wearing too much eyeliner and doing what she said, putting her hand up this woman’s skirt, movement visible through the fabric -   
“She tried something,” Daisy says, “Tried to make me do something. Go away. Find someone else. But I grabbed her and took her down to the station-”

Jon thinks of Trevor Herbert, how he was strong enough to resist the vampire’s telepathic abilities. Someone who could resist the spiders’ siren call would be useful. 

“Put her in a cell, went to have a shower to clear my head, and when I come out...there’s baby spiders everywhere and the new guy has to sign a Section 31. You can see why I didn’t tell Basira. ”

“Huh - a real close encounter.” He laughs and doesn’t know why. His stomach is still churning. Wonders if the next time - there might be a next time, you never know - he’s...intimate with someone, he’ll think of this story and keeps his fingers to himself. 

“Just like the one you had with Prentiss. Are you going to throw up?”

“No.” But his mouth is full of bile and he feels incredibly tired. 

Home calls; his home, with his clothes and his bed. No purring Admiral to wake him; no Georgie making tea in the kitchen. Just him and his head full of stories and his heart full of nothing. 

“I’ve got orders to drop you home.”

“Thank you. I’m-”

“I know where you live, Sims. I’ve been there before, remember?”


End file.
